Chapter 7: The Misleading Customs (Part 1) (This chapter is free)

The next day, the boat started, and the people on the shore gradually became farther and farther away. The man seemed to have not returned yesterday and was still asking about ghost stories on the street. He could not see the person's appearance clearly when he was far apart. He only felt that in the morning light, the crazy back looked very lonely and desolate.

During the rest of the journey, Zhao Xing was considering his identity arrangements. When he returned to Chengjiaao, he only remembered the most during the entire journey. The lonely back, which was the scenery on both sides of the straits.

It was noon when the boatmen drove the boat into the simple pier. The earnest boatmen insisted on sending the children home. In fact, they wanted to see the legendary Chengjiaao. Zhao Xing was stunned and did not bother to oppose it. The children were careless and jumped happily, leading the boatmen onto the mountain road.

Climbing over the hill, under the strong noon sunlight, rows of brand new brick houses across the valley from the hill to the valley. The boatmen made a breath of breath, which made Zhao Xing wake up in a panic. He winked at the children repeatedly, and the children woke up and quietly surrounded the boatman.

"Tsk tsk tsk tsk, it's so... what a big house... Ah, the house where the magistrate of my county lives is just like this." The oar master stood on the ridge and sighed, and suddenly realized that something was wrong.

Transportation was not developed in the Song Dynasty, and the people pursued the concept of "the sound of chickens and dogs is heard, and they will never interact with each other when they die." Many people never stepped out of the small village where they lived in their lives. Although the boatmen traveled around the country, they had never seen such a brick house in such a whole village. They did not expect that in this remote and poor valley, there was such a rich village hidden.

Chengjiaao must still be hidden now, because now the registration is made, the prefecture will send a gentry to manage it. Only Chengjiaao himself has a gentry, registered with the government, and returned to the government's rule will be cost-effective. At the same time, Zhao Xing did not want people to discover Chengjiaao too early because he does not have a suitable identity yet.

After the Master Bolt finished sighing, he saw that Zhao Xing had already looked fierce. He traveled around the world and had different skills in observing words and expressions. He immediately got closer: "The little old man Huo Xiaoyi, that neighbor... Ah, I once said that Cheng Jiaao's teacher knows all the astronomy and geography - look at the ship's construction, it's too stable!... Do you need a boatman? The old man has been driving the boat for 20 years and is planning to find a place to live."

In fact, the oar master was not old, but the wind and rain made him look like an old man.

However, compared to Zhao Xing's youth, he is qualified to call himself an old man.

Zhao Xing stared at him for a while, then suddenly waved, called Cheng Xia, and reminded him: "Take them to see your father."

After saying that, he led his hand to ask the oar master to move forward.

This is a escort attitude, but the oar master has no way to refuse.

When he walked into Chengjiaao, Zhao Xing seemed to have forgotten the existence of the boatman and walked towards his home. Cheng Xia was stunned for a moment, then he woke up and escorted the boatman to the ancestral hall.

In the mountain residence, the doors are generally not locked because the villagers live in the villages with the same surname and there will be nofty cases. In this environment, Zhao Xing's door is never locked. But Zhao Xing remembered that he closed the door before leaving the door. Now the door is open, and there is a sound of sweeping the floor in the yard. He stopped in surprise, listened for a moment, walked into the yard in a clueless way. Then, he saw Cheng Azhu sweeping the floor with sweat on her head.

They are all from the same village, so he certainly met Cheng Azhu before. It is said that this girl is the most beautiful unmarried daughter in the village. Because she wanted to marry a city man, Cheng Laoqi trained her to learn the etiquette of the city man very early. Therefore, among a group of wild girls in the countryside, Cheng Azhu seemed particularly quiet.

Cheng Laoqi had no children, so he was in an awkward situation in the village. According to the Song Dynasty laws, his land would be shared by Cheng Azhu with his nephew. However, because Cheng Azhu was going to marry into the city, the land in the village was useless to him. Cheng Laoqi handed the land to his nephew early on, and the father and daughter rented it on part of the land handed over by his nephew. He also had to save this little money to buy a dowry for his daughter, so life was a bit tight.

When the village was fully renovated into a brick house, Cheng Laoqi was not even able to follow the trend. Zhao Xing couldn't stand it, so he instructed Cheng Xia to lead his classmates to renovate Cheng Laoqi - this move alarmed the clan leader Cheng Tong.

His own tribe members need pity from outsiders, which is a shameful act for Cheng Tong. Moreover, his son is young, and Cheng Tong is still counting on his children to pass the exam and is not willing to let him do heavy physical work. So, at the order of Cheng Tong, all the young and strong men in the village went out to help Cheng Laoqi complete the renovation of his new house.

It was during the renovation project of the old house that Zhao Xing had several contacts with Cheng Azhu. Although the clan finally developed labour and the favors fell on the patriarch, without the reason for Zhao Xing, there would be no new house for them. So to thank him, Cheng Azhu made several new pairs of shoes for Zhao Xing.

Zhao Xing had no good impression of the handmade cloth shoes, and his only impression was that the soles were very uniform. Considering that Cheng Laoqi's family was poor, several pairs of uppers might have spent part of the little girl's dowry, Zhao Xing's return gift was also very generous. For this reason, Cheng Laoqi personally came to thank him several times. After a while, the two sides had contact.

Cheng Azhu is a quiet girl. Zhao Xing considers the other party’s marriage status and the contact between the two parties is polite. It was from Cheng Laoqi that he learned that women in the Song Dynasty actually had the right to inherit and could participate in the distribution of their father’s property.

In the Song Dynasty, women were divided into women who were married, and women who were married. Women who were married referring to the clan. Women who were married referring to women who were unmarried. Women who had equal inheritance rights with their male heirs in terms of property distribution. Women who were born in the clan pointed out that women who returned to their parents' home after marriage due to the death of their husbands. The inheritance rights were slightly inferior to women who were married. Women who were married were even lower, almost none.

Women in the Song Dynasty had complete control over the dowry. After she died, if she had no children, the dowry would be returned to her parents' home. Therefore, the Song people married daughters and the dowry was particularly generous. Many royal princes and high-ranking officials of the court even borrowed debts to marry daughters.

Cheng Laoqi started to accumulate dowry since his daughter got engaged. In the past few years, the people in the village were very poor, so his money accumulated slowly. After Zhao Xing brought deep processing technology for agricultural products, Cheng Jiaao's wealth began to explode. Because Cheng Laoqi had no land care and had more spare time, coupled with Zhao Xing's "policy inclination", he also quickly prepared a dowry for Cheng Azhu in this craze for getting rich.

In fact, Zhao Xing was quite despised about Cheng Jiaao's so-called "richness". The villagers were used to being poor, and suddenly they had spare money on hand, so they were easily satisfied. For example, Cheng Xia was the son of the clan leader and the head of the child, so he had shares in all industries in the village, and his father also enjoyed his success as the richest man in the village. The richest man's family's wealth was 240 cents.

As for the "two rich" Cheng Lao Er's family's wealth is even more pitiful, less than a hundred stakes. Currently, Cheng Lao Er's new income every month, and the calculation is only about 2 to 7 stakes. The second rich in the village is still like this. As for what Cheng Lao Qi calls "rich dowry", the value is only about 30 stakes...

Based on the days, the girl is about to marry. She and the waiter have made an appointment to get married in the autumn. Cheng Laoqi plans to go to the city to enjoy the happiness after the autumn harvest.
Chapter completed!